Forgotten frost
by Freemania
Summary: You know that one charachter who is always forgotten in the series. The one who is a sub charachter among sub charachters. No real personality or charachter development. This is the story of that charachter. Tory Froid


Tory Froid. One of the if not _the _singlemost neglected characters in anime history. If you search for Fanfics with him as the main character in the Megaman section there are two. In reality I know of ten here on . If you look for fanart there are about three pictures of deviant art. If you search for internet shrines there are none. This is the sad story of a neglected character.

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Disclaimer- I do not own or anything affiliated with capcom. If I did things would be different MORE TORY!

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Tory laid back in his bed as he listened to the soft sound of the raindrops hitting the roof of his house. He had nothing to do. Lan had been informed that there was a meteor hurtling toward earth infected by the soul of darkness and driven by slur… or something like that. The point was that he had call all of his friends, Maylu, Yai, Dex, Chaud, Raika, even Chisao, and told them to meet him at the Ayano-tech building so they could take off into space and have Megaman shoot his Mega-buster at the computer which just happened to be in the Meteor and blow it up… or something like that.

It was Tory's own fault though. He'd let himself get his hopes up that maybe he'd get called in as well. He didn't. And so it was his own fault for daring to think that him and his Eskimo navi were important enough to be thought of in a time of emergency.

"Are you okay Tory?" he heard a voice from his computer say

"Yeah I'm fine"

"You're not upset or anything" Iceman said. Tory turned to look at his computer screen. The small ice-navi had a worried look on his face. That was nice of him. All he had to do when he was worried was remember that he had a net-navi that cared about him. That made everything seem okay.

"I'm fine Ice-man really" he said even managing to force out a smile.

He heard a knock on his door.

"Son, I'm off to work" his father said and like every-day he removed Iceman's PET from its console and holstered it at his side.

"Okay, Bye Dad, Bye Iceman" he said managing another smile. Hey this smiling thing wasn't so hard after all. His dad was about to leave the room but then he turned back and looked at Tory with the same eyes that Iceman had just had. Tory raised an eyebrow.

"Son I'm worried about you" his father began and walked back into the room. "It seems like all you do is sit around the house lately. I miss the old days when you would always be out with that friend Lan of yours helping him rescue his navi or whatever mischief you guys were getting into. Sure you were in situations far too dangerous for a kid your age to ever be in but you're a bit older now and I think you can handle it…"

"Plus you don't have to worry with me around!" Iceman smiled as he said this and Tory couldn't help but smirk a bit. They were pretty good net-battlers weren't they. He'd built up a pretty good battle-chip collection and he was definitely learning how to operate a smaller navi.

"The point is" his father continued. "Back in those days you used to come home smiling. I miss that." He said and then Tory's dad came in and gave him a tight hug. Tory hugged back equally tightly and they stayed like that for a little bit. Tory's dad had a thought.

"Maybe I should just stay home from work today" he said a whimsical look on his face. "We could go down to the lake and go swimming then have a picnic on the grass. We'd make a day out of it!" he smiled and let go of Tory. Tory thought about the idea for a while but then shook his head.

"Dad the waterworks needs you there. You _are _the boss after all. If you weren't there the city wouldn't have clean water" his dad pouted at him.

"I'm sure they could manage without me for one day. Besides I feel a bit sick all of the sudden. Might need to take a sick day to recuperate" he said faking a cough. Tory rolled his eyes at his father.

"You've got tomorrow off right. We'll do it then. Don't worry about me dad I'll be fine"

Tory's dad reluctantly submitted.

"Okay Son but you've got to promise me something"

"What?" Tory asked

"Do something today." His dad said frankly. "It's a Saturday, go out and do something. Something in the sunlight you're entirely to pale!" his dad said jokingly

"Okay" Tory said rolling his eyes as his dad ruffled his hair.

"Bye Tory!" Iceman exclaimed as Tory's dad walked out of the door. Tory waved back.

Tory heard the door close and sighed. Every day his dad went to work he was reminded of the sad truth that Iceman was his fathers navi not his. He considered just rolling over and taking a nap but he remembered his promise to his father. The question then became what could he go out and _do?_ He thought about possible activities as he took a shower and got dressed. His father was right he was pretty pale. He considered going to the beach but that was too much like what he was going to do with his dad tomorrow so he decided to go down to Higsby's chip shop instead. He needed to get a few more battle chips for his collection anyway. Maybe he could even make a few trades.

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When Tory got to the chip shop he saw Shuko working behind the counter.

"Hey Tory!" she said and gave him a bright smile. She had cheered up significantly in recent days. She wasn't downing on herself as much and had stopped calling herself the unluckiest girl in the world.

"Hey Shuko" he said trying to put on a happy face. He was actually pretty good at this and could do it most of the time successfully but people like his dad and Iceman just naturally new him well enough to see past his faux smile.

"So what's up Tory! Some special reason you're coming in here today?"

"Not really. Just had nothing to do and thought I'd com in and make a couple trades"

"Well then, let me see chips you have to trade and then you can choose a chip of equal value for each one you turn in" she said and looked over the chips. Tory wasn't turning in any high-level chips mostly because he didn't have any. He was just turning in a few swords and cannons witch were useless to a navi as small as Iceman in exchange for bombs and other projectile weapons.

"seems like you're getting more into net-battling these days" Shuko said typing in the chips codes into the computer.

"Yeah" Tory said. "I just re-worked my entire Chip collection to fit Iceman's fighting style" he said rather proudly.

"Well just don't you work that cute little navi too hard okay. If something happened to him my Spoutman would be so sad! He'd start crying and then the entire chip shop would be flooded! Or at least the cyberspace around the chipshop would be" Tory smiled

"Don't worry me and Iceman don't get into too many fights anyway. Just a few down at the arcade for fun. It's really fun to actually _win_ for a change" Tory said and Shukko gave him his new chips.

"You know with you getting so good at net-battling you should try something a little more serious. Why not challenge Lan and Megaman to a battle!" Shukko said. Tory shuffled nervously.

"I don't think me and Iceman are quite ready for that just yet Shukko but maybe someday…" Maybe someday, yeah right. Maybe someday the grass'll turn magenta. There was no way he was going to be able to take on lan and Megaman, not now not ever. They were Net-Savors. Megaman had Soul-unison. They could use program advances! No Tory didn't think he'd be taking on Lan and Megaman. Shukko pouted.

"Well, that's okay I suppose. You and Iceman just keep working hard and keep getting better and better!"

Shuko and Tory stayed and talked a bit longer but some customers came in and Shukko being the only one manning the shop had to help them. Tory looked at his watch. It was only 9:30. He supposed he'd fulfilled his promise to his dad just by going out in the first place but somehow he thought he should spend the entire day doing something. So he decided to go to the park if for nothing else then for the fresh air. After the park he decided to go to the arcade and watch a few net-battles before getting a bite to eat at World-3 curry. It was always a bit awkward going there. He didn't really have much of a problem with the majority of the former World-3 operatives. After all they'd caused some trouble but they'd never been _major _villains. Then there was Maddy, the infamous Ms. Madd. He didn't like being around her much. She'd kidnapped his father and threatened his life. She'd told her navi Circusman to delete Iceman. She'd never apologized. The entire World-3 team had apologized to Lan and Megaman for their antics but no one had ever apologized to him. Not that he expected an apology from the other two, but he at least expected an apology from her. He _deserved _an apology from her. Ofcourse that was always Tory's problem wasn't it. Tory always _expected _things, he always thought that in the end he'd get what he deserved and this was simply not true. Great now he was depressed again. Why hadn't he just gone to McDonalds. He left the small Curry shop in a complete funk. He was now more depressed than he had been in the first place. He glanced again at his watch. It was 2:00, his dad wouldn't be home till 5:00. He decided to walk through the market place and look into all the shops at shiny things he couldn't afford. Sure him and his dad were better off than your average person. His dad _did _run the entire Den-tech Water works after all but still he hated asking his dad for money when he didn't really need it. He preferred to make his own money doing odd jobs and even a little small-time virus-busting for the neighbors. He looked into the store window. A new computer was on sale. It wasn't anything he really needed, his old computer worked fine but still. It was bright, and shiny, and new, and it had a net navi on it… wait what? Tory looked at the strange net-navi that was showing on the computer screen. It had full grey armor with darker grey gloves and-it was gone. The odd navi saw him watching him and logged out. If only he had Iceman with him. He would've liked to have checked out the odd navi. But he supposed it didn't matter, if the navi posed any threat Lan would take care of it, he always did.

And so Tory decided it was finally time to go home. It was almost 3:30 when he went home and so he decided to take a nap seeing as he had nothing else to do and there weren't any good television programs on.

Tory loved sleep because only in sleep could he dream. Dreams were like the ultimate television program in which he was the main character. The world of his dreams was a beautiful lie witch he could wrap himself in and escape the harsh truths of the real world. That night Tory had a very interesting dream. He dreamed that Gospel was back and that this time Lan and Megaman had invited him and Iceman to help out. Together they mowed through the hoards of Gospel navis until they found out where the Gospel headquarters was. They stormed to warehouse and found the leader of Gospel. Only it wasn't the leader of gospel. It wasn't Kid-grave and it wasn't Dr. Wily. It was Tory. Tory stood there, a gun in his hand pointing it back at lan and himself. It was like a dark after image. The Tory that stood in front of Tory had dark grey hair and blood red eyes. It wasn't Tory at all.

Tory woke to the feeling of is father nudging his sides. He woke up and rubbed his eyes. The clock read 10:30. He looked up at his dad, his eyes were red and puffy and his hair was askew. Something bad had happened. Tory tried his best to stay solid as his dad told him how some virus had attacked the Waterworks system. How it looked like a Metaur but once attacked became something much stronger. Tory told himself he had to be brave when his dad told him how he'd been taken completely by surprise and how bravely Iceman had fought to protect the other net-navis and save the water works. Tory prepared to hold back the tears when his father told him that the virus had been wounded and ran off but Iceman had been mostly deleted in the process but then Tory realized that no tears were coming. Tory knew he should have felt angry at his dad for letting Iceman take on such a dangerous situation. Tory knew he should have been sad that he'd never see his navi again. Tory knew he should have been hurt that his father had taken so long to relay this news to him. But he wasn't. He knew what he should have been and he wasn't that. As his father handed back his PET which contained a small revolving snowflake symbol made from all that was left of Ice-man all Tory felt was nothing. He felt frozen, he felt numb.

Later on that evening he stared at his computer screen looking at the revolving snowflake that was all that was left of his former navi Iceman. He stared and he stared and he stared waiting for the tears to come but none ever did. Thought came instead, thoughts and questions. What would be done about the strange virus that had deleted his partner? Would it delete others? Would it simply die, having been wounded by Iceman? He'd never heard of a virus intelligent enough to runoff after being wounded. Lan and Megaman would take care of it, they always did. What about his navi? Would he get a new navi? He supposed his dad would have too eventually, it was essential to running the waterworks. One question rang out in his head above all others. Do net navis go to heaven? Do net navis have souls? Tory flopped back down on his bed and thought about that for a long time. He decided he didn't know weather or not net-navis had souls, he would just have to wait until he died to see if Iceman was up there or not. _Who says you have to wait. _Tory entertained the thought. It was a though that had creped it's way into his subconscious many times before but he had always pushed it back, but this time was different. This time it was louder, stronger clearer. Why not? Why not just go nd see right now? It's not as though you've got anything going on here? Maybe it'll be better than this? Maybe- Tory heard a sound from his computer. It was the sound of somebody logging into his computer. It was probably a glitch. Probably just his computer still recognizing Iceman as a net navi, that snowflake was essentially Iceman's carcass. He sat up and saw that it was no glitch. There on his computer screen was a net-navi. The same net-navi that he'd seen at the shop earlier today. It moved slowly and it was bleeding black data from several places on its body. Its left arm was gone and there was a sizeable hole in it's torso just below it's emblem. Its helmet was badly damaged.

"…need…" the navi gasped out choking out another chunk of the data that was it's blood. "…need d-data" the thing said. It spotted Iceman's snowflake and moved as fast as it could towards it. It made sense, the snowflake was made of data. Tory could've stopped the navi. He could have yelled for it to stop. He could've gotten his dad. He could've simply turned off his computer, but he didn't. He sat there and watched as the bleeding navi inched closer and closer to the snowflake. The second the navi layed his hands on it a window popped up, and then another, and then several more until his entire screen was filled with windows of varying sizes and functions and then one popped up in front of them all. And this window simply said one word

ASSIMILATING…


End file.
